Higgins chasing BOM, as massive storm looms large

THEY have become Australia's go-to storm chasers, but it's not just the wild weather they're after.

Higgins Storm Chasing, which has built its reputation on delivering accurate weather information on Facebook -- often ahead of the Bureau of Meteorology -- has now amassed more than half a million "likes" on the social media network.

The site, which also offers paid subscriptions, claims to reach more than four million Australians per week via its updates which include rain and storm forecasts, videos, maps, and a variety of shared images from fans.

As of Wednesday morning, Higgins had built to 538,718 supporters on Facebook, compared to the Bureau of Meteorolgy's 693,399.

While the BOM often shares beautiful landscape images, Higgins Storm Chasing tends to focus on the more dramatic -- high-speed winds, snowfalls, thunderstorms and flooding rains.

Higgins Storm Chasing predicts rainfall across Queensland on Thursday and Friday this week

Higgins is likely to close the gap as it trains its eye on an "unseasonal winter rain event" that will drench much of the state from Thursday.

It warns that up to 200mm could fall in South-East Queensland, but while there is only one meteorological mdoel predicting that, it does belong to the BOM.

In its latest missive, Higgins Storm Chasing predicts:

All Central and Northern districts are likely to receive widespread moderate to heavy rainfall with 50mm likely through North West, Central North, North East & Central West districts.

These totals increase to between 100 to 200mm for the Southern Tropical Coast and Central Eastern districts.

While the Southern and South East parts are expecting light rain there is uncertainty at this stage for amount of rain based on the exact position of the upper low and potential surface low development.

Chart courtesy of Higgins Storm Chasing

Jeff Higgins said the weather for the weekend remained unclear, as modelling became divided, but rain was assured.

"Again we are looking at more follow up rain across large parts of the state after recent systems which is just incredible for this time of year" Mr Higgins said.

"This forecast rain is way above average for this time of year and could set new monthly and daily records for some locations.

"Keep sending it down and breaking the droughts back!

"The areas we will be watching closely is Central districts for flooding to develop.

"The South East could get a big dump also but that remains just too uncertain to lock in at this stage."